Analyzer

Water

The World Health Organization identifies water quality as a critical element in global disease prevention. It has been instrumental in spreading the word about increasing access to safe drinking water, and improving sanitation, hygiene, and water management to reduce the risks of water-borne infectious diseases.

Water municipalities can prevent outbreaks of disease and contamination by checking their water supply for microbial and chemical contaminates. Charm’s water quality diagnostics help protect and improve water quality by rapidly identifying fecal indicators and contaminants, such as coliphage, coliform, and E. coli, to identify “at risk” water supplies for viral and bacterial pathogens. Charm also makes tests for detection of chemical contaminates such as pesticides and antibiotics. Charm ATP tests may be used to assess cleanliness of storage tanks, CIP waters and distribution systems and can provide an early indicator of undesired biologic activity in water sources. These tests are used to ensure safe drinking water, process waters, surface waters, and bottled water.

Microbial/Pathogen Tests

Viral pathogens are responsible for over 50% of water borne illness. Coliphage is a virus particle to coliform bacteria and is considered a viral fecal indicator in ground water that complements bacterial fecal monitoring. Coliphage may also be used as a viral process indicator in water recharge applications and waste water treatment before discharge.

Fast Phage is an EPA approved test for detecting coliphage in water that provides an early warning in 8 hours and is confirmed the next morning. This type of validation and verification is consistent with a HACCP approach to water safety.

E*colite is a qualitative enzyme substrate method that has EPA approval for detecting coliform and E. coli in 100 mL volumes of water in 28-48 hours.

PathoGel is a quantitative form of E*colite forming spots of blue for each coliform and blue & fluorescence with E. coli. In addition there is a black indicator for enterobacteriaceae which are a broader class of gram negative organisms found in water.

Sanitation/Hygiene (ATP)

Adensosine triphosphate (ATP) is an excellent water quality indicator of total biologic activity resulting from microorganisms, as well as plant, animal or food material. PocketSwab Plus tests detect ATP in the water and can be used to monitor control of biofilm and identify and remediate higher contaminated levels. The WaterGiene luminescence swab test rapidly measures total ATP (intra and extra-cellular). ATP measurements complement conventional microbiological testing. For example, for bottled water processors, an additional filtration step enables the WaterGiene to specifically identify microbial sourced ATP.

Antibiotics Tests

Pharmaceutical manufacturers need to ensure surface rinses are free of specific antibiotics. Public health authorities need to ensure that drinking water is not contaminated with antibiotics that may have leached their way in from home waste water, agricultural, medical or pharmaceutical sources. Antibiotics used in agriculture are known to leach from animal waste to surface and ground water. The Charm II and KIS tests offer unique rapid solutions to detect antibiotic and anti-microbial drugs in water and waste water.

Allergen Tests

Charm AllerGiene is an ATP-based allergen control test designed to prevent cross-contact from allergenic food soil on process equipment. It measures ATP (adenosine triphosphate) at low levels as an indicator for the presence of food in rinse waters.

Pesticide Testing

Pesticide usage in agriculture can inadvertently contaminate ground water and drinking water. The Charm CideLite test is an enzyme-linked bioluminescent assay that detects organophosphate and N-methylcarbamate insecticides and their active metabolites in water. The 15 minute CideLite test is 100 to 1000 times more sensitive than assays using an acetylcholinesterase reaction.